Learn How to Stucco in 12 Easy Steps

1. Purchase ingredients for stucco and dump into the plastic tub specifically made for mixing stucco. Discover that specifically designed stucco mixing tub is actually too small to mix stucco.

2. Drive to Lowe's, purchase second plastic tub. Return home, divide mixture in half, add the required 2 teaspoons of water, start mixing.

3. Discover that the cement mixer previously mocked at the store is now worth it's weight in gold as mixing large tubs of sand and water is not only agonizing but also takes forever.

4. Become frustrated and add three times the amount of water required in order to speed up the mixing process.

5. Stucco finally mixed, dump some on a trowel and smear it on the wall.

6. Watch all the stucco fall off the wall and onto the ground.

7. Repeat until sweaty and frustrated, then pick up stucco with hands and begin smearing on the wall manually, as a monkey might smear feces.

8. Continue to smear until the "may cause flesh burns" label is spotted on the cement bag.

9. Scream in a girlish manner and hop up and down frantically until a hose is procured.

10. Locate rubber gloves and continue to smear stucco on walls.

11. Once stucco is completely smeared on the wall look up youtube videos online on "how to stucco". Watch videos of Mexican laborers in America doing excellent stucco work, and American missionaries in Mexico doing shitty stucco work.

12. Decide to refer to the stuccoed walls as having a "custom hand applied finish", open a stucco company, and make millions because the only equipment needed is two tubs, a rake, and a pair of rubber gloves.

Dr. Livingston, I Presume?

We have reached Threat Level Radioactive Killer Insects here in the Zamora household. At this point I'm waiting for the green ooze to start leaking out around the foundation because I'm pretty sure that we're living on top of a subterranean pool of nuclear waste. That's the only logical conclusion I can come to based on the size, variety and sheer number of insects and terrifying creatures that have been invading our house.

It started when I moved Hiccup's dog crate and what I thought was a very small and active worm started making it's way across the floor. Oh, how I wish it was a worm. But as I looked closer, I realized that there was something very, well, snake-y about it. I did what any young, independent, and strong female would do- screamed for Danny. He captured it, and we stared at it in horror for a while as it slithered frantically in the bottom of a glass, slowly realizing the implications of the baby snake. MORE. BABY. SNAKES. I pictured hordes of snakes everywhere we turned. Fortunately we only found one other snake a couple of days later, just as tiny, and also very dead courtesy of our cat. This is the only thing she is really useful for- killing things around the house. Except sometimes she doesn't even bother to kill them because she finds it more entertaining to bat them playfully around the house and then leaving them angry and vengeful.

Okay, so we had the plague of snakes. Then we had the horde of cicadas that spent their day hiding in the plants around the house and making the exact same noise that's in the previews for Texas Chainsaw Massacre (I don't know if that noise is also in the movie because the noise in the preview freaked me out too much to watch the movie. Little did I know I would soon be surrounded by thousands of little horror movie props predicting my imminent demise and transformation into a human skin lamp.)

Once the monsoon rains hit the cicadas migrated back to hell or wherever it is they came from. But the rains brought a far more terrifying creature. We first spotted one in the road, squatting menacingly and waving it's furry legs at us. The tarantula. The next night there was another one the size of a salad plate crouched by the laundry room door. We brought Hiccup inside because if this thing wanted to it would eat Hiccup for a midnight snack. All that would be left is a wagging furry tail hanging out of this things mouth. If spiders have mouths, that is. But I don't actively try to destroy insects as long as they stay outside of my house. And tarantulas are so large and furry that it's kind of like trying to squash a chihuahua, it's almost grosser to kill them than it is to make them leave (correction: have DANNY make them leave). But the worst was about to come:

So, I'm blind. Like, I can't see more than 6 inches away from my face clearly without glasses or contacts. In the morning I wake up and stumble blindly into the shower. Are you already thinking to yourself "No! Mia, don't get into the shower!" It's like the begining of a horror movie when the dumb blond gets into the shower while the creepy man with the axe hides in the bathroom closet. Anyway, I pick up my loofah, wash, then put the loofah down. Which is when I notice a dark blob on the side of the tub, next to the loofah. I immediately become concerned because anything big enough for me to see without my glasses is pretty freaking huge. I bend closer, squinting inquisitively ("Mia! Noooo!") only to find myself face to face with a baby tarantula. By baby, I mean the size of an average human baby. I leap out of the shower and sprint into the living room shrieking "Big spider! Big spider! Danny! Big spider!" (I'm very articulate when I'm naked and panicking)

People, this is getting serious. I feel like I'm in the jungle with vines and spider monkeys slowly creeping through the windows. I'm going to wake up to javelina curled up on the foot of my bed, rattlesnakes under the sink, and tarantulas in my bathtub. Oh, wait THAT'S ALREADY HAPPENED.

I'll be at Costco buying Raid in bulk if anyone needs me.

Namaste

I have a love-hate relationship with yoga. When I started it a few years ago I had a very laid back gentle male teacher who led us through the poses slowly and deliberately. We spent a lot of time in poses like "child's pose" which is essential kneeling down and putting your forehead on the floor. It takes about as much strength as napping. So, I thought I was pretty good at yoga. Granted, I can barely touch my toes and "downward dog" was always a struggle rather than the resting pose it is supposed to be. But I enjoyed it, especially because it's the only exercise you can take where you are supposed to lie on the floor and "meditate" at the end. I quit going for a couple of years, until friends persuaded me to join their class. I had fond memories of lying peacefully in a darkened room, so I agreed. Turns out it was the hour and a half "power hour" they had invited me to. But the end I was a trembling blog of sweat and yoga mat grime. I went a few more times, and got a little bit better, to the point where I didn't feverishly eye the door in the middle of the "warrior pose" and try to calulate if I could vault over the other participants and dash out to my car. I didn't, mainly because I didn't have the strength to run.
Then, I quit going for a while. You know, life tends to get in the way, and the studio is across town. But I'm on a new health kick, and I invited a friend to brave a new class with me.

There's always an interesting mix of people in yoga classes. There are usually one or two sorority girls who got lost on their way to the rec center, one or two guys dragged in by the women they are hoping to sleep with and so are desperate to spend time with, a couple average to fat chicks who are hoping that yoga will be a less strenuous path to fitness than running, and then the rest of the class is filled with hippies. And I really don't like hippies. There are several reasons for my dislike. Now, I realize that I am making sweeping generalizations and relying on stereotypes, but it seems like every hippy I've come across falls into these characterizations. They talk about wanting to "save the world" or "end poverty" or "end capitalism" but their method of promoting that change is to join protest rallies or meet with groups of other people who feel the exact same way they do. They wear flowing skirts, dreadlocks, thai embroidered purses, and hang tibetan prayer flags in their yards. They refuse to "compromise their principals" which means that they refuse to change their appearance or method of persuasion in order to be taken seriously by anyone other than people who already agree with them. When was the last time you saw a legitimate hippy politician, lawyer, or anyone else in a position of power that was taken seriously by the mainstream media? Don't get me wrong, politically and morally I'm almost as hippy as I could be without wearing hemp sandals and getting a tattoo of "the goddess" on my back. But the hippies I see are lazy and illogical in their approach to change. They feel safer repeating the same dogma to each other so they never engage in a useful dialogue with The Others. The people I have seen who are committed to making real changes in this world wear suits, get a Master's degree in something other than "philosophy", and start working their way up the ladder until they are in a position of power. They aren't compromising their principals, but they're being smart about the way they act on them.

Anyway, that's enough of a diatribe on hippies. However, there is one more thing I hate about hippies. They are ALWAYS good at yoga. They are skinny and wirey and ridiculously flexible.
So when my friend "Selina" (name changed to preserve her dignity) and I walked into the room it was wall to wall skinny, smug, tattoo'ed and dreadlock'ed hippies. I was expecting this, it is a yoga class after all, so I lay out my mat and pretended to stretch. We began a simple cycle of poses and I thought to myself "oh, this isn't that bad, I must be in better shape than I thought!" But then the instructor started going faster. And faster. Pretty soon I was three poses behind everyone else. The hippies suddenly turned into hippy-robots and seemed to merely push the fast forward button. The instructor started giggling evilly, which I considered to be a bad sign considering we were only about five minutes into the hour long class.

That giggle was definitely a harbinger of doom. I have blocked out most of my memories of the class, but at one point I remember lying on my stomach, desperately reaching back to grab my sweat soaked ankles. I flailed for a while, praying that suddenly my arms would grow 6 inches longer so I could grab my ankles. All around me the hippies rocked as serenely as boats, hands firmly around their toes. Hippies don't sweat. I think perhaps my teacher sensed my growing hippy-rage because at one point, I don't remember what pose it was other than that it was extremely painful and I couldn't even get to the first part of the pose while everyone else was tied in a knot and suspending themselves in the air with their pinky fingers, she came over to me and gently forced my arms wider and my legs straighter. As my joints began to strain and pop she said cheerily "Everyone comes to this class at their own level. The most important thing is to put yourself fully into each movement" She then turns my head further past my shoulders. She looked into my eyes, and said in a stage whisper "You have a big smile on your face. That's the perfect attitude to have". I was clearly the special ed portion of the class. I didn't have the energy to tell her that the "big smile" was actually a grimace of pain, and that if I had been able to move my arms at all I would have punched her in the face.

The class continued for what felt like a week. Towards the end I was pausing during poses to pretend to massage a sore muscle or tend to a weak ankle when I was really just desperately trying to catch my breath. Selina was less subtle than I was, and at one point was just squatting on her knees laughing hysterically as the hippies levitated around her. She pointed out later that the woman next to her was visibly pregnant. We pictured her fetus doing the poses right along with her. Better than us, naturally. Because hippies are born, not made.

Can I get the accessories without the actual baby?

Pretty much my one reason I want a child right now is so that I can finally buy all the wonderful baby things at Ikea. They have the most adorable stuff for babies and kids. Things like, bunk beds with tents over them. Not just any tent, but a tent with STARS ON IT! If I could pursuade Danny to sleep in the bottom bunk with half of his body hanging uncomfortably off the end, I would totally buy one for myself. Or perhaps I could just buy this leaf canopy and hang it over our current bed so that I could pretend to be a fairy princess lying in a bird's nest in an enchanted tree. Then I could gaze up at my sun ceiling lamp while playing with my blue giraffe
For a second today I got extremely excited because I realized that while I don't have kids, I work with kids! I could decorate my office with Ikea toys! And lamps! And we could play with the fantastic Swedish stuffed animals while we talk about feelings! Then I remembered how, as a fresh faced, naive social worker I brought some of my childhood stuffed animals to work, thinking that they could comfort my clients as they had comforted me for so many years. Instead, they sat neglected on a shelf in favor of the half broken plastic toys that came with my office. Neglected, until someone needed to sneeze, or drool, or take out their rage by punching something. Then Bearland Cub and Hobbes were the first creatures in their hands. I have since taken my animals home and run them through the washing machine. They still look a little shell shocked.

So, no Ikea furniture for me. I'll stick with my crappy plastic happy meal toys and my sturdy office lamp that is too heavy for anyone to throw at me.

The Homestead

Now that the inside of our house has been, for the most part, completed I can start indulging my green thumb. Although I am planning on using only indigenous plants, so it's more like a "greenish-brown and spiky" thumb. I started with two miniature gardens this weekend, one filled with transplanted cactus from around our property:

and one filled with succulents we bought at Lowe's:

I've started taking pictures of all of our renovations, and am going to put together a big "before and after" posting. But here's two of the projects that have made me particularly happy. One was our front door, which was dented, dirty, and painted a very pale pink. It is also a very unusual size that has made it virtually impossible to replace. So we took it off the hinges and I repainted it with the image of brightly colored Victorian houses in my head, but to match a plate we got in Nogales:

The fireplace in the Arizona room was made with native lava rock, but unfortunately was sloppily installed and was covered with cement that couldn't be removed. Then the kids who partied in the house when it was abandoned set a fire in fireplace without opening the flue, so it was soot-stained. We built a frame around the existing fireplace and then walled it in with peacock slate and used glass tile accents:

The picture doesn't do justice to the slate which is full of beautiful colors and shimmery mineral deposits.

And, finally, the view from our front door. This view makes me feel very, very lucky every time I walk out of the house. We have our second generation of Gila Woodpeckers being raised in the saguaro on the right side.

Hard Labor

I've spent the last two days helping Danny build a solar powered gray water system. This is his brain child and if you ask him about it he can tell you all about how it works, but really my only contribution has been manual labor. Well, manual labor and whining. An integral part of the system is a series of pipes leading from the shower and the washing machine to a 300 gallon container we have housed in an old chicken coop. Pipes that have to be buried. Buried in trenches that have to be dug. By me. Now, we live in the desert which means we do not have "dirt". We have sand, dust, and rocks. To make it even better, we live right by a solid rock mountain, which means that we live on top of solid rock, covered by a thin layer of smaller rocks and dust. You can stick a shovel about a 1/4 of inch into the ground before you hit rock. If you pound on it with aforementioned shovel you can break through another 1/4 inch. The last time I tried to dig a hole I ended up with a disabled pinky finger. But since I had no idea how to assemble the system of pipes, I was stuck digging the trenches. Oh, and it's 100 degrees out. I took a break to go to the hardware store with Danny, mainly so I had an excuse to be in air conditioning for a while. But I was tired, cranky, and dirty. So when Danny started showing me low energy lightbulbs and talking about how much less of an impact our house would have on the environment, especially with our new gray water system, all I could say was "the environment can go fuck itself." He suggested I go home and lie down for a while.

It's the Blanket....With Sleeves!

This year I decided to be the loving daughter my mother deserves, rather than the absent minded one who calls a week late to wish her happy birthday, so I got her Mother's Day presents. I don't think I've done that since I was young enough to get away with a hand glittered card. My first gift was Dooce's first book, accompanied with a card that read "Happy Mother's Day! I'm glad giving birth to me didn't result in your institutionalization in a mental hospital". Touching, right?

My other gift was a stroke of genius. My mom used to wiegh as much as normal moms do, that is to say, as much as I do now without children (*sob*). Anyway, somewhere along the way she managed to lose a lot of weight. She says through diet and exercise, but I think that's a legally binding confidentiality agreement all skinny people have to sign after they get whacked with the Skinny Fairy's wand. The downside to being skinny is that she doesn't have enough insulation to keep her warm, and she unreasonably refuses to eat more cheeseburgers to remedy this. So I decided to send her the Snuggie:

This picture demonstrates the versatility of the snuggie, as it fits Teresa who is about 4 feet tall, and her husband Zac, who is approximately ten feet tall. For those who have not heard of the Snuggie before it is THE BLANKET WITH SLEEVES! Perfect for people who are too skinny to survive in the wild. Not that I am bitter.

Anyway, I went to the snuggie website and began the snuggie ordering process. I entered my credit card number, my address, and my mom's address. I clicked "order one set of snuggies", since it's buy one get one free (with free book light!). The next page pops up: "Do you want a free snuggie?" Thinking that the question was a bit redundant, I clicked yes. The next window- do you want a DELUXE snuggie, featuring adorable pictures of kittens or puppies? Although the fleece-y eyes of the kittens stared at me plantively, I thought I clicked no. Then a couple more windows popped up, and I apparently had something of a brain spasm and just began clicking the yes button to make them go away. Suddenly, my order confirmation page appeared. "Congratulations! You ordered 6 snuggies for the low price of $99.94!" I order $100 of snuggies in a variety of stylish colors. And I had to allow 24-48 hours for my order to process before I could call them to change it. This led to an embarrassing conversation with my husband:

Me: Um, I did something bad.

Danny: *sigh* What?

Me: You know how I wanted to order my mom a snuggie? Well, I accidentally ordered too many.

Danny: How many is too many?

Me: 6.

Danny: Oh that's not too....

Me: For $100.

Danny: WHAT?

And, of course, by the time I was able to call and attempt to cancel the excessive snuggies the order had already shipped. However, the snuggie people were perplexingly generous, perhaps because I was not the first person to accidentally order 6 times the number of snuggies they intended to, and they gave me ALL BUT ONE SNUGGIE FOR FREE! I got FIVE FREE SNUGGIES! And an unknown number of free book lights. The best part of this entire debacle was when my mom received an enormous box from the snuggie people, and opened two of the individually wrapped inner packages before she decided to call me at work to see if I had lost my mind entirely. She was pleased with the snuggie concept, but berated me for thinking she would want the "sage green" snuggie since she thinks green makes her look sickly, and one has to look elegant when wearing a blanket with sleeves. However, she then told me she has been wearing a fleece jumpsuit around the house when she gets cold, so I am still confused about how a sage green snuggie is unexceptable but what are essentially adult footie pajamas are the height of fashion.

Since then I have been thinking about other people I can bequeath snuggies upon. My officemate and I decided we are going to wear them at work, since our office is usually cold enough for us to see our breath. Danny thought maybe he could forsake clothing and just wear around a snuggie, and then I was thinking that Siva might appreciate a snuggie she could wear on cold winter nights. Does anyone else have some suggestions on innovative uses of the snuggie?